Leaked Oath Keepers list includes Virginia cops, military personnel and officials

​​Twenty-five Virginia legislation enforcement officers, army members, first responders and elected officers seem on leaked membership lists of the far-right Oath Keepers militia, per a brand new report printed Wednesday by the Anti-Defamation League.

Why it issues: The Oath Keepers have risen to nationwide prominence for his or her alleged position within the lethal Jan. 6 Capitol riot, writes Axios’ Ivana Saric.

• The occasions of Jan. 6 additionally highlighted recent considerations about home extremism within the army after a number of former and present army members had been charged for his or her involvement within the riot.

State of play: The leaked membership checklist was printed by the journalism collective Distributed Denial of Secrets and techniques (DDoSecrets) in September 2021. The ADL’s Middle on Extremism went via the 38,000 names on the lists to establish those that held “delicate positions,” the group mentioned within the report.

• The ADL recognized 15 members of the group from Virginia actively serving within the army, greater than some other state.
• The group additionally recognized six legislation enforcement officers, three first responders and one elected official within the state.
• ADL’s report cites a deputy sheriff in Chesterfield County as amongst members who supplied up their skilled experience to the group.

What they’re saying: Chesterfield County Sheriff Karl Leonard mentioned in an announcement that he considers membership within the group “a protected First Modification proper.”

• “If at any time the road is crossed to violence, any prison act, or any actions discriminatory in any vogue, swift motion shall be taken,” he mentioned.

Price noting: An ADL spokesman advised Axios the group isn’t figuring out rank-and-file law enforcement officials or different public workers, however has alerted these members’ employers.

• “A person’s inclusion within the Oath Keeper database isn’t proof that they had been or are nonetheless an Oath Keeper, that they maintain or held all or a few of Oath Keeper ideology or viewpoints, or that they ever actively participated in Oath Keeper actions,” the ADL’s report said.

The one Virginia member of the group the ADL would publicly establish is Appomattox County Supervisor John Frederick Hinkle, the only real elected official from Virginia recognized on the militia’s membership rolls.

• Reached by cellphone, Hinkle advised Axios he recalled trying to affix the group however did not imagine he was profitable as a result of his “dues by no means went via.”
• Hinkle has not tried to cover his curiosity within the group. In 2020, he explored beginning an Appomattox chapter of the Virginia Oath Keepers, per the Occasions Virginian.